How
Palpatine gains control of both the Empire AND Anakin[Wednesday,
April 26, 2000]

The
Force.net had a very interesting scoop: an Episode II plot summary
that is said to come from the production companies themselves! Although
the person who posted the summary says "it's so sweeping and
broad it could have been written by my sister", I think the
summary does contain some interesting details. Let's take
a look and comment:

Set
10 years after Star Wars Episode One: The Phantom Menace....
TPM ended with Palpatine becoming Supreme Chancellor of the Senate,
and he'll have had 10 full years to consolidate his power and
'control the bureaucrats'. The senate will probably be very different
from the one we saw in TPM.

Darth
Sidious takes over the Republic....
Pay attention here! Note that it says: "Darth
Sidious takes over the Republic". Why not
"Palpatine takes
over"? Could this indicate that Palpatine makes it looklike someone else (Sidious) takes over the Republic? Will
he continue to use his double identity to his advantage?
Very interesting!!I think
this might be the KEY to the plotline of Episode II.
Read on to see why!

...turns
it into an Empire...
This jives with what is said in the Prologue to the Star Wars
ANH novel: "Aided and abetted
by restless, power-hungry individuals within the government, and
the massive organs of commerce[Trade
Federation], the ambitious Senator
Palpatine caused himself to be elected President of the Republic.
He promised to reunite the disaffected among the people and to
restore the remembered glory of the Republic. [We've
seen this in Episode I ]. Once secure
in office he declared himself Emperor, shutting himself away from
the populace." So the throne that is being
built in Australia on the set according to a previous spy report
on theForce.net, could be located in Sidious' palace where he
isolates himself from the world around him.

...and
begins to control everything.
I suppose he'll have used the 10 years in power to build up his
Imperial army to tighten his grip on the Galaxy. And this time
he'll have used better material than the clumsy battledroids of
The Phantom Menace (clones
perhaps???)

The
Clone Wars reach their pinnacle....
What or who causes these Clone Wars? Could we find a clue in the
Prologue as well? Let's read:"Soon
he was controlled by the very assistants and boot-lickers he had
appointed to high office, and the cries of the people for justice
did not reach his ears." I never paid
attention to this, but it really says that Palpatine himself becomes
the victim of the people around him, who control him. That's yet
another reason to use his Sidious identity to carry out his personal
agenda. Could these Clone Wars be started by the power-hungry
"assistants and boot-lickers" that surround the Emperor
and take control of the Empire?

....as
the Jedi Knights struggle to defend the galaxy from the forces
of evil.
The Jedi Knights "struggle to defend the galaxy". That's
a completely different situation than the one in TPM. The Jedi
Council is confronted with the powerful return of the Dark Side,
and they probably weren't prepared for that.. This indicates that
we might see lots of Jedi Knights in action. Perhaps the members
of the Jedi Council will leave their (ivory) tower and take charge
of several 'armies' of Jedi, fighting in different places/planets?
After all, we know that we will see Yoda fight himself, and also
Mace Windu is rumored to fight in Episode II.

Meanwhile,
Anakin Skywalker falls in love with Queen Amidala....
Under which conditions this will take place is still unknown.
But they probably are put together in a joint adventure once again
(freeing the slaves on Tatooine?), and they fall in love.

....but
begins to succumb to the Dark Side of the Force."
So already, Anakin starts to fall for the Dark Side of the Force.
Will Palpatine/Sidious be involved in this?What if Palpatine makes it SEEM that Sidious has taken over
the Republic, and pretends to be the victim himself?He
teams up with Bail Organa (his former colleague and CO-candidate
for the post of supreme Chancellor), recruits young Anakin and
Obi-Wan to fight with him in the Clone Wars to regain control
over the Empire. Anakin thinks he is battling for a good cause,
but in the mean time, Palpatine has all the time of the world
to influence Anakin and push him in the direction of the Dark
Side.... In this scenario,the double
identity of Palpatine is of CAPITAL importance!!

I might be completely wrong about all this, but somehow I've got
the feeling that I'm on the right track with this speculation.
What do you think? Let me know in the
Discussion Forum!

Lots
of things happening on the Episode II rumor front. Let's take a
look at the latest developments:

»
"The Seventh Tower"?

Moriarty
published an article on AICN in which he mentions the title "The
Seventh Tower" as being the title of Episode II. How much credit
should we give this title? As I posted on the Force.net, "The
Seventh Tower" is the name of a series of books for kids published
by Lucasfilm / Scholastic, so it's not very likely that it's going
to be the title for Episode II as well... If the title is used by
Lucasfilm at all (we don't know how reliable Moriarty's source is),
it can only be as a 'dummy' title in my opinion, a bit like "Blue
Harvest". Although... the "Blue Harvest" title was
part of a cover up attempt to keep nosy fans away from the sets,
which is not the case here I think...

»
The Castle rumor

T'bone
posted a report
on his website recently in which there's mention of an attack
on a castle on a mountaintop during the final battle of Episode
II. Some people continued to speculate about this rumor and said
that this could be Vader's castle as shown in some preproduction
art for The Empire Strikes Back. Personally, I don't think the rumor
is legitimate. But people already start to add up the AICN title
and this rumor and before you know it, the whole thing will be mentioned
in TV shows and magazines as 'fact'. :) Oh well, I guess that's
part of the fun!

Hello
everybody! I wish you all a happy Easter Holiday! What's new? I've
posted another Flash movie; it shows the rumored 'assassin' character
receiving his orders from Darth Sidious on Coruscant.

Nathaniel
Reed wrote me to tell me that the old discussion forum was down
again, and I decided that this might be the right moment to introduce
theNEW Discussion Forum
I've been setting up for you during the last couple of days.

The
Forum has always been a very important feature of the Virtual Edition.
It enables you to talk about the latest rumors, launch new Prequel
theories and ideas or just chat and meet other Star Wars fans who
visit the Virtual Edition.

»
The old forum

The
old MVP forum, although equipped with some great features, also
had some MAJOR draw-backs: it only had one general discussion section,
it was impossible for me to have any administrative control at all
over the forum (and we've had our share of trouble-makers in the
past!), and the MVP server was not very reliable and could suddenly
die for several days. At one point, the forum even went down for
SEVERAL months!

»
The new forum

That's
why I've worked hard to set up this
new forum, which is much more user-friendly and has some
very cool options (you can include your personal photo or picture,
you can use emoticons, html and even voice-snippets!) I also have
much more control over it's content (I can move messages, ban trouble-makers
and introduce new discussion categories). The only (small) effort
that is asked of you, is to register again. I suggest you hurry
before your favorite nickname is taken by someone else! :)

Enjoy
the new forum!

Exciting
rumors from Australia[Friday,
April 21, 2000]

The
Force.net posted some very cool rumors yesterday. According to an
unconfirmed report, "Slave-1's cockpit interior has been built
at the Sydney Fox Studios in preparation of Episode 2 filming"
!!! And that's not all: construction workers are also working on
the Emperors new "throne"!

If
this report is legitimate -and I must say that I think it sounds
like real old-fashioned reliable spy-material :) - this gives us
some very important information about the plotline of Episode II.

»
The Slave-1 ship
First, let's look at the implications of the "Slave-1 cockpit"
being constructed. This could be THE Slave-1, Boba Fett's ship,
or it could be a Slave-1 'type' of ship. It's even possible that
the cockpit will be used for several ships, just like they
built only one Starfighter cockpit for all the interior shots
of the yellow fighters in The Phantom Menace.

»
The Emperor's new Throne
And what about the Emperor's throne? Ten years have gone by since
The Phantom Menace. Ten years during which Palpatine has been
able to strengthen his power as Supreme Chancellor. The use of
a throne might indicate, that he's already seeing himself more
like an Emperor, than as the Chancellor of the Senate (we didn't
see Valorum sitting on a throne). In the mean time, Palpatine
might have constructed a palace for himself (I haven't read Kevin
J. Anderson's history of Coruscant -perhaps there already was
a palace on Coruscant). Will this throne be the same one he used
in Return of the Jedi? That would be a great way to introduce
some continuity between the prequels and the existing episodes.

As
you can see, the news about the Slave-1 returning in Episode II
has inspired me to make a Flash-movie that shows the Slave-1 departing
from Coruscant. If Boba Fett appears in Episode II as a bounty-hunter,
he might get his orders directly from Palpatine...

Some
thoughts about the rumored 'assassin' character[Thursday,
April 20, 2000]

Some
more speculation about this assassin/thief character mentioned on
Harry Knowles' site. I'm still unsure whether or not the information
is legit. Let's take a look at some possibilities:

the
information is false-
very well possible. For TPM, most of the actors didn't have any
information prior to the actual filming; the most they'd get were
a few pages of script or "you'll have to shave your head"
(Ray Park). Here, there is said to be a whole portfolio of sketches
and character descriptions. And even preproduction art with written
comments! ("hologram in Jedi Council room"). That's
a lot of (pretty sensitive) information. Too much information
perhaps?

the
information is legitimate - possible too. The character
could be a good follow-up for Ray Park's Darth Maul. Just as dangerous
and evil, but still very different. A stealthy assassin working
for Palpatine to eliminate his political adversaries. The contract
signed by the actor is said to be for both Prequels; which would
imply that the character is pretty important.

the
character is the new Sith apprentice of Darth Sidious
- likely, but not 100% sure. It's nowhere mentioned in Harry's
report. It could be just one of the bounty-hunters working for
Palpatine. If he IS Sidious' apprentice, he'll probably be killed
by Anakin, because Anakin becomes the new Sith Lord. "Always
two there are"...

the
character is Boba Fett
- hmm... an unmasked Boba Fett. I don't know. Somehow I don't
think that's very likely. However, Boba Fett will be in Episode
2, and we also know he survives Episode 3. But Boba Fett without
the armor wouldn't really be Boba Fett. I guess Fett will be a
rather minor character in the Prequels.

What
about the "Hologram in the Jedi Council chamber" text
on one of the sketches?
- I don't know. That particular detail sounds really fishy to
me. Remember those rumors about preproduction sketches of battlefields
on "Concord Dawn"? This sounds like the same kind of
bogus information - it's just too detailed.

"There
was this folder with this character in many settings and also
in other costumes". His appearance seemed to change like
a chameleon" - Hmm. Pretty vague from someone
who has actually seen the sketches. Why not give us more details?

"Weapons
: Sorry... didn't see. But I was told they would all be made with
CG"
- again, sounds really fishy. Who told him this? Someone from
ILM? Not really.

To
conclude: I'm still very skeptical about this rumor.
Several elements of the report don't ring true to me. I'm curious
to see if there will be more 'scoops' about this character soon.
In case it's a bogus rumor, the person who makes it up is usually
encouraged by all the attention on the Internet to come up with
even more (fake) details. But perhaps I'm wrong, and the character
DOES exist. You can show your opinion by voting in the poll on the
right side of this page.

dark
horizontal band from one ear to the other
"that makes him look like that girl robot in "Blade Runner."
(no horns)"

Body
= Also Dark gray, covered with small sigils/marks

Eyes
= solid black (i.e. no white parts, like "Hellraiser")

According
to Harry's alleged spy, the character in the screen tests wasn't
like Darth Maul, but more of "a thief/assassin character. His
on screen time will be in the shadows killing various characters
quickly and silently." One of the test lines was 'Failure is
not allowed..' "This was said as he approaches a character
(don't know who) from behind to kill him/her." Harry's report
also contains a description of pre-production sketches: "One
sketch had text on the bottom, and the part that stands out most
to me was "Hologram in the Jedi Council chamber".

What
do we have to think of all of this? It's a pretty big scoop if
it's the real thing. The character could fit in pretty well with
one plot-element we already know: Palpatine's rise to power. I can
imagine Palpatine getting more and more power as supreme chancellor
in the Galactic Senate, while -as Darth Sidious- he orders his bounty
hunters to kill his political adversaries...

However,
no one else has confirmed this rumor yet... so unless the Force.net
or some other site comes up with some more 'evidence', we'll have
to wait for the official casting announcements to know wether or
not this information is true. Until then... LET'S SPECULATE!! :)

Hi
everybody! It's been a long, long time ago since I last updated.
The only activity that has been going on all these months has been
the Discussion Forum, thanks to all the people hanging out there.

The
last few weeks, we've seen a steady increase in Episode II news
on the Internet. Lucas says the script is finished, the casting
is underway, the artists are busy working on pre-production art,
Natalie Portman has already gone through 10 hours of costume fittings
and even Harry Knowles is reporting about mysterious oriental Sith
Lords... It's just like the old times again!

It's
high time to jump in again, and get this Virtual Edition back on
the road! As you can see, the lay-out is being updated (it's far
from being completed though), and 'behind the scenes' I'm transforming
the site into a database-driven website (I learned how to work with
PHP3/MySQL during the last few months). When principal filming will
begin, the Virtual Edition will hopefully be fully functional again
:)